And if there’s a bug in that code, you’re fucked.
Safety features should work if everything else fails. Their failure mode can’t be “fuck it, it didn’t work”. Which is directly opposite to the failure mode of a subscription based service.
This is why:
-
The FTC needs to do its job and start outlawing all these obscene subscription business models for things that are rightfully products, not services. Where’s my goddamned First Sale Doctrine, FTC?!
-
Software Engineers working on commercial products need to be professionally licensed, so that proper consequences can be applied for unethical “fail-deadly” designs like this one.
As a software engineer, the thought of my code being responsible for someone’s safety is fucking terrifying. Thankfully I’m not in that kind of position.
From experience though, I can tell you that most of the reasons software is shitty is because of middle or upper management, either forcing idiotic business requirements (like a subscription where it doesn’t fucking belong!) or just not allocating time to button things up. I can guarantee that every engineer that worked on that thing hated it and thought it was fucking stupid.
Licensing would be overkill for most software as it’s not usually life and death. I think in this case since it’s safety equipment it really should have been rejected by NHTSA before it ever hit stores.
I can guarantee that every engineer that worked on that thing hated it and thought it was fucking stupid.
As a software engineer who was also a civil engineer-in-training before switching careers, I think one of the big overlooked benefits of being licensed is that it would give engineers leverage to push back on unethical demands by management.
This is managements fault, not the engineers fault.
We have to implement the requirements we are given. If we don’t, we get fired and they hire someone else who will do it.
If we don’t, we get fired and they hire someone else who will do it.
If we were licensed, any replacement would be similarly ethically bound to refuse and that tactic wouldn’t work.
My dad worked for AAA. Once he got a call because a lady’s car errored out and thought she didn’t have her seatbelt buckled mid-drive, so it shut the engine off. On the freeway.
Even without a subscription, failsafes should always fail safe.
Thorium reactors have a cleverly dumb failsafe. If reactor control fails, there’s a plug that melts and drains the contents into a container that’s not fit for runoff neutron generation.
That’s an example of a failsafe that fits its purpose. It’s still possible to fuck it up, but it would take a lot of effort to do so.
